Lambeth will receive £50,000 to fund creative projects thanks to London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s Social Enterprise Development bid, announced last month.
Lambeth Council will receive £50,000 to aid the Lambeth arts scene and to tackle issues such as affordable housing and cultural participation.
Much of the grant will be injected into Brixton with organisations such as Pop Brixton and Reprezent Radio said to benefit.
Councillor Matthew Bennett, cabinet member for planning, regeneration and jobs said: “Brixton is world-renowned for its extraordinary character, rich diversity and cultural heritage.
“It also has a well-developed creative industries sector, with more than fifty visual artists working at Brixton Village for example and Reprezent Radio broadcast cutting edge UK music from Pop Brixton.
“But there are also challenges such as a shortage of suitable workspace, rising property prices, some residents feeling excluded from the borough’s growth, high levels of deprivation and relatively low levels of cultural participation.
Peter Flack CEO of Artist Studio Company hopes the attention the bid will garner will encourage housing legislation to be amended to encourage affordable housing throughout London.
“I think it will help in terms of Lambeth drawing up an affordable works space policy. We have three buildings in the borough so roughly around 291 spaces,” said Mr Flack.
“We’re a charity and our main objective is building and managing affordable workspace for visual artists.”
“It will highlight to developers the benefit of including affordable workspace clauses into schemes especially subjective sites when our involvement may unlock a site for development.
“If a developer can see if a local authority is going to view an affordable workspace scheme positively then developers will obviously include it in the scheme.”
The eleven London boroughs receiving the funding will each develop bids to become one of three Creative Enterprise Zones which will be announced later this year.
